On the weekend of July 23-25, the SCA 97 Girls, coached by Chris Ziemer, travelled to San Diego, to compete with the very best teams in the nation at the 31st annual Surf Cup.  Out of a strong field of 16 teams, the 97 girls had an impressive showing and advanced undefeated to the quarterfinals.  In group qualifying games, they defeated Socal State Cup semifinalists, Slammers 1-0 with a goal by Monica Furne.  They tied San Diego Surf White 1-1 (Shelby Evenich scored on a penalty kick) and then tied Washington State finalists Eastside FC 0-0 to advance. Their only loss was to So Cal Blues Dodge, ranked #8 nationally.Coach Ziemer was impressed with his team this weekend, "Competing at Surf Cup is always exciting because it provides the chance to compete at an amazing facility as well as against the top teams in the US.”  

Throughout the weekend, scouts from the US National Team had a chance to see all of the U15 teams in action.  The team has been to Surf Cup several times before, but failed to advance out of the group, so that was our initial goal.  We opened the tournament with a key 1-0 win over Slammers, which is regarded as one of the top clubs in the US.  In the following game, we took on host San Diego Surf and trailed at the half, but the girls responded to earn a crucial tie.  In our final group game we played a very capable Eastside FC team from Washington, and with them needing to win to advance and a tie or a win meaning we would move on, they put us under a tremendous amount of pressure from the start.  Our girls defended well to earn a 0-0 tie which meant we advanced to the quarterfinals for the first time.  In the quarterfinals, we played against Socal Blues, another of the the top clubs in the US.  We were still a bit tired from the morning game against Eastside and fell behind 0-1.  We came out strong in the second half, but they scored against the run of play to go ahead 2-0.  At that point, we pushed numbers forward to try to get back in the game and they eventually beat us 3-0.  It was a great weekend for us, and not only did we get 3 great games, but we showed we could compete with the top teams in our age group."  Congratulations to Coach Chris and to the girls!